


during the darkness of the light, he re-entered like lightning

by klaviergavout



Category: Steam Powered Giraffe
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, i love wink so much!!, kinda mad i didn't write this sooner, starburner isn't a travesty but you know what is?, that includes me, the best satellite in the world deserves Better, the fact that no one's written about wink on here yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 19:35:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17566664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/klaviergavout/pseuds/klaviergavout
Summary: When he reboots a few minutes later, his clothes are caked in dirt and his moustache is only half-attached. His boiler still feels choked up and he can't quite lift his left arm right. But he's a war machine, he's built for falls like these. He'll manage.What Hatchworth doesn't quite understand is the dominating pull he feels towards the whatever-it-is that just crashed several feet behind him.





	during the darkness of the light, he re-entered like lightning

They're stargazing when it happens- it's what they normally do on nights like these, when the whole Manor is bathed in moonlight and endless galaxies look down from above, twinkling and sparkling in the cloudless sky. It definitely beats stasis, Hatchworth thinks as he observes the stars, nestled comfortably between his siblings on the grass below. Rabbit gives his hand a little squeeze and he knows that if he had the capability to feel _real_ emotions he'd be happy, content even. Instead, he just feels empty. Hollow. But it's a good sort of empty. it's right. He wouldn't want it any other way.

If he looks close enough he swears he can just make out the edges of blue matter rifts, ever there but not there, like little dotted lines breaching the dimensions of time and space. He knows Spine and Rabbit can't see them and he's okay with that- he can hardly see them either, to be honest. Once you've been through a blue matter portal once, you never go back- there's always an awareness of strange energies scattered across the universe, of something _more._ But that something could be dangerous and he never, _ever_ wants to put his family in danger, never again. So he doesn't feel like he's keeping some big secret from everyone just because he knows they're there.

He's eyeing the newest rift, a tiny thing, stretching curiously through the middle of Cassiopeia, splitting the celestial W in half. And then suddenly he sees something appear and flicker nearby- a shooting star, maybe? Rabbit likes shooting stars, he should tell her. But just as he's about to remind her to make a wish he gets a horrible, suffocating feeling inside his boiler.

That shooting star isn't going sideways, he realises.

It's going down.

"Guys," he says, sitting up and frantically patting their arms, "guys guys guys guys guys guys _look._ "

Rabbit stirs beside him but doesn't give an answer, evidently half-asleep- but The Spine notices almost immediately, letting out a soft gasp and scrambling to his feet, emerald optics trained on the star. "Move!"

He reaches down and grabs Rabbit by the arm, tugs her up, and runs for it. Hatchworth follows. The three of them leg it towards the Manor, an eerie Stuka-like whistle getting louder and louder as the star- or whatever it is- hurtles through the atmosphere and towards the Earth's surface. They're almost at the door, meters away, when--

**CRASH.**

Hatchworth feels his whole body _lift_ , propelled from the force of the aftershock, and then he lands- hard- headfirst on the ground. Everything goes black. All he hears is static, then nothing at all.

When he reboots a few minutes later, his clothes are caked in dirt and his moustache is only half-attached. His boiler still feels choked up and he can't quite lift his left arm right. But he's a war machine, he's built for falls like these. He'll manage.

What Hatchworth doesn't quite understand is the dominating pull he feels towards the whatever-it-is that just crashed several feet behind him. It's not his own curiosity talking, even though it often leads him into strange situations; one time he went through a blue portal hidden inside an old hard drive from the 70s and ended up in an alternate dimension where humans write stories about him and post them on the internet. He had nightmares for weeks.

"Hatchy, no," says Rabbit, her hand tight around his wrist, stopping him from moving. Only then does Hatchworth realise that he'd gotten up from the ground, despite the strangely loose sensation in his arm, and actually started walking towards the... the _foreign object._ "It's d-d-d-dangerous. You don't know w-what's down there."

He makes an effort now to focus his photoreceptors and actually look at the thing so that maybe he _will_ know what's down there. From the way the moon is hitting its surface it's definitely something metal. Several antennae protrude from its rounded top, crooked and defective, and the whole thing is flanked by two majestic, panelled wings. Steam pours from its vents as it overheats.

It's a satellite, that's for sure. A broken satellite. Useless debris. A steaming hunk of space junk.

But not an unfamiliar one. What interests Hatchworth the most about this satellite is the faint glow of blue light pulsing faintly around its edge, as if something's glowing on the other side, something out of view. Something like a core. Like a soul. That's when he realises he has to go down there, they _all_ have to go down there. They have to save this satellite.

He keeps on walking until Rabbit grabs him again, more firmly this time. " _Hatchy._ "

"Rabbit, it's one of _ours,_ " Hatchworth pleads, shoving her hand away and she doesn't try to stop him. The look in her eyes says she knows. "It came home. We have to help it."

Hatchworth reaches the crater and effortlessly makes his way down the rocky curve (those fancy shoes aren't just for show, they're tough as nails). He walks round the great broken sphere till he's facing it head-on, and what he sees there makes him stop in his tracks:

A colossal, shuttered telescope eye, its pupil an intense blue.

Hatchworth reaches a tender hand out and caresses the side of the satellite's huge lens, relieved that the satellite hasn't been tainted by any green matter. That would make fixing the satellite far more complicated, not least for a Walter. "Heya, big guy."

Indecipherable beeps and blips come from deep inside the satellite, fuzzy and panicked and punctuated with static as if from a faulty vocoder. But Hatchworth can make out a few faint words- or at least, the beginnings of. _cRasH. hELp. pLaNEt. wiNK._

"Wink?"

The satellite gives a weak, robotic chirp in response. That's a strange word for a satellite to recognise, Hatchworth thinks, diligently checking round its body for any damage. But sure enough, there in bold red paint underneath its right wing, W.I.N.K #109.

"Why did you come here? Do you--" and here Hatchworth pauses, distracted, still trying to work out what W.I.N.K stands for-- "do you need our help?"

The satellite attempts to speak, still only managing a few words at a time. Stranger ones, now. _spACe. aPPLe. giANt. grEEN._ A larger-than-average jet black tear slides gently down the satellite's plating as it trembles and whines; from the impact of crash-landing or from sadness and fear, Hatchworth can't tell, but it's breaking his nonexistent heart the longer he stands there and watches it cry.

He reaches up to wipe its tears away but there's far too much liquid- when Hatchworth steps back his sleeve is soaked and his fingers are dripping with oil. Seeing this, the satellite cries even more, so much so that its tears begin to coat the bottom of the crater. Hatchworth rubs a soothing hand down the rim of its eye in an attempt to comfort the poor machine before the oil below can reach his ankles.

"There, there, buddy. Start with your name."


End file.
